Table of Contents

• EDITOR’S RAMBLE 🗣

• FEATURED REPORT 📰

• IN OTHER NEWS 🗞

• AROUND THE WEB 🌐

• STUFF THAT MIGHT HELP YOU 👌

EDITOR’S RAMBLE 🗣

I’ll be at LegalTechTalk tomorrow.

It’s a massive legal innovation conference in London, focused on how tech is transforming the legal industry.

There will be discussion on:

• AI

• automation

• law firm efficiency

• the future of legal work...

If you’re interested, I can do a summary of what I learned from the conference (that’s relevant for an aspiring lawyer).

If enough of you want it, I’ll get it done.

- Idin

P.S. I know a few of you are volunteering at the event. If you spot me there, come say hi!

FEATURED REPORT 📰

🇬🇧 How global uncertainty helps the UK’s M&A market

What’s going on here?

According to research from White & Case, the UK’s mergers and acquisitions (M&A) market has done well over the last year.

Lawyers expect this strong performance to continue for the rest of 2025. Patrick Sarch, a partner at White & Case, says there’s “good reason to be optimistic” about more deals happening this year.

How busy is the UK M&A market right now?

There are two main ways to measure how active a country’s M&A market is:

1. 📈 By volume: this looks at the number of deals that happened

2. 💷 By value: The total amount of money spent on those deals

In 2024, there were 3,468 deals in the UK worth $248.6 billion.

That made the UK:

• The second-busiest M&A market in the world by volume of deals (behind the US)

• The third-busiest by value (behind the US and China)

The UK outperformed every other country in Europe, both by deal volume... 👇️ 

... and by total transaction value 👇️ 

This strong performance has carried into 2025, with 50% more deals taking place between January and June this year compared to the same period in 2024.

What are the biggest UK M&A deals to know about?

📆 2024 highlight

• Deal: International Paper (US) merged with DS Smith (UK)

• Value: $18.5 billion

• Sector: Paper and packaging

• Law firms involved: 

  • Skadden advised International Paper

  • Slaughter and May advised DS Smith

📆 Biggest 2025 deal (so far)

• Deal: Saipem (Italy) merged with Subsea7 (UK)

• Value: $6.3 billion

• Sector: Offshore energy and drilling

• Law firms involved:

  • Clifford Chance advised Saipem

  • Freshfields advised Subsea7

📆 Most talked-about deal in 2025

• Deal: DoorDash (US) bid to acquire Deliveroo (UK) — we wrote about that here

• Value: $3.9 billion

• Sector: Food delivery

• Law firms involved:

  • Latham & Watkins advised DoorDash

  • White & Case advised Deliveroo

Which sectors are seeing the most M&A deals?

🖥️ TMT (tech, media, telecoms): Tech companies are under pressure to adopt AI and data tools, so they’re buying firms that already have them instead of building from scratch.

🏢 Business services: These firms have steady income from long contracts, which attracts buyers. Private equity is also buying and combining smaller companies to build larger, more efficient businesses.

💷 Financial services: There are lots of small players, so firms are merging to grow and cut costs. New banking rules like Basel 3.1 coming in 2026 are also leading bigger firms to sell off parts of their business.

How is instability abroad fuelling M&A at home?

Private equity firms are behind a lot of big UK deals — around a quarter of all mergers in 2024, including half of the top 10 biggest deals.

Because the global economy has been shaky, these firms have held back from investing in other regions. As a result, they’ve focused more on the UK.

That trend could continue. Private equity firms still have $1.2 trillion of unused cash (known as ‘dry powder’) ready to spend — and the UK remains a key target.

Why is the UK more attractive to buyers right now?

• 🟢 Stable inflation: UK inflation fell close to the Bank of England’s 2% target in 2024. This made future costs easier to predict, helping investors make decisions more confidently.

• 💸 Lower interest rates: With inflation under control, the Bank of England cut rates. Borrowing is now cheaper than in many other countries, making deals funded by borrowing more affordable (PE deals are typically funded by debt).

• 💷 Weak pound = US discount: As UK rates fell and US rates stayed high, the dollar became stronger than the pound. This makes UK companies cheaper for US buyers, who effectively get a ‘currency discount’ when paying in pounds.

• 🏛️ Supportive government policy: Since Labour’s election in 2025, the UK has pushed for more deal-friendly regulation. The CMA (the UK’s competition regulator) has been told to prioritise growth and speed up deal reviews.

• 🤝 UK–US trade deal: The UK is one of the few advanced economies with a trade deal with the US. UK firms pay lower tariffs on US imports, keeping costs down and profits higher — especially in sectors like aerospace and manufacturing. That makes them more attractive to investors.

How can you use this in your applications?

If you’re facing an M&A task in your applications (say, as part of a case study), it’s easy to focus on global uncertainty — like US trade tensions or geopolitical risks.

But a higher-level answer could show how the UK has turned that uncertainty into opportunity.

With falling inflation, lower interest rates, and a US trade deal, the UK now looks more stable to investors. That’s driven a rise in M&A (and more legal work for firms).

Corporate teams lead these deals, but other departments are key too:

• Tax lawyers help structure transactions to minimise tax, especially in private equity deals.

• Employment and real estate teams support due diligence — checking staff contracts, pensions, and leases.

• Finance lawyers advise on debt-funded deals, drafting loan terms and negotiating with lenders.

Firms with lots of private equity clients will be especially busy, as PE will look to spend its $1.2 trillion of dry powder.

Plus, a lot of these deals will probably be cross-border — especially from US buyers. So, firms with global offices or strong global networks are well placed to win this work.

Finally, show you understand the internal impact too. A rise in the amount of legal work means more pressure on firms. They may need to hire more lawyers or offer better incentives to keep talent. Flagging this sort of thing shows you’re thinking not just about legal work, but how a firm runs as a business.

IN OTHER NEWS 🗞

• 🍫 The EU wants to investigate Mars’ $36 billion deal to buy Kellanova (the company behind Pringles and Pop-Tarts). The concern is that it will cause less competition in the market. Mars didn’t offer any solutions to ease the EU’s worries, so now a deeper review is likely. Skadden is advising Mars and Kirkland & Ellis is advising Kellanova. If the deal isn’t done by 13 August, either side can walk away — but they can also extend the deadline twice by six months if regulators are still looking into it then.

• 🏦 Metro Bank might be heading for a takeover. The bank’s main shareholder, Colombian billionaire Jaime Gilinski Bacal, is considering selling his stake after a recent bounce in the share price. He’s been approached by Pollen Street Capital, a UK private equity firm, which is eyeing a takeover that would take the bank private. But their talks have stalled over price disagreements. Metro was worth £1.6 billion when it listed in 2016, but it’s faced years of regulatory issues since then.

• 🔍️ The UK’s competition watchdog is looking into Getty Images’ proposed £2.9 billion takeover of Shutterstock. The CMA wants to know if this deal would give Getty too much power in the stock image market, which could hurt UK customers. They’re asking for public comments until 7 July before deciding whether to launch a full investigation. If the deal goes ahead, Shutterstock would become part of Getty, combining their huge image libraries — especially to help grow their AI tools. Both companies already offer AI-generated images, and Getty is in an ongoing legal fight with Stability AI over how its content was used to train AI models.

AROUND THE WEB 🌐

• 🧠 Brainy: A crossword puzzle but with maths (I tried it — even lawyers can do this)

• 🗞 Throwback: A tool that shows news headlines from the day you were born

• 🎬 Vibey: Pick your mood and get movie recommendations to match

STUFF THAT MIGHT HELP YOU 👌

• 📹️ Free application help: If you're applying to commercial law firms, check out my YouTube channel for actionable tips and an insight into the lifestyle of a commercial lawyer in London.